Containment: The Fight for Freedom
by LoveTheCrazy
Summary: One-shot. Part of The Eternal Journey Series. Takes place after From The Darkness We Enter. He was no longer the man she knew. He was no longer a man at all. Zero-centric.


Death waits for no one. That is the saying, no?

His issues with death, however, were not a matter of selection, but merely a matter of choices. Especially in his case.

He was no longer someone of value, he no longer could do anything worthwhile to help others. He stayed here, in this rusted, old loft sitting against the windows with a bottle of liquor close at hand.

He no longer deserved to be cared about, he had become a human shell who relied upon liquor and the sweet oblivion that he felt when the substance overwhelmed him to get through each day. They had tried to visit once or twice. They stopped when the newly emptied bottle of vodka shattered next to Himeko's head. He had stopped caring long before that.

He had tried to make it a clean break, oh how he had tried. But she, in all her willfulness and tears and goodness and everything that she was...she had not let him. It had ended up in a standoff in the lobby. It had ended with his cheek stinging and both of their hearts broken in two. That was the only way it could have ended, in retrospect. Yuuki always had a flair for the dramatic.

So he left with only the clothed on his back and a place Aki had quietly muttered he could stay. An abandoned loft on the bad side of town. It was suitable for his needs.

At first, he visited the hospital; sat down in the uncomfortable leather chair beside their bedsides. He would talk about stupid things: how the nurse was sick that day, the weather was getting colder (winter was almost here again), the hidden colony of roaches that had taken up residence in his bathroom...eventually he couldn't even do that right. So he would sit there silently, staring at the off-white wall waiting for his life to make sense again. It didn't.

Then came the drinking, oh how he acquired a taste for hard liquor, relishing the burn as it slid down his throat and warmed his veins. He hadn't felt warm in so long, the only thing that had brought him warmth in the year after he left. Yuuki remained the one person who he knew could do that, but even then he had forgotten what she felt like. He could no longer remember the her skin felt as he held her hand, or the way her eyes shined when she laughed. No, those memories were tucked into a dark corner of his mind that only came out to play at night.

That was another reason he took to drinking: when he had finally passed out there were no demons to haunt him. No spirits of the dead, no memories, no loved ones swimming before his eyes. He had learned quickly how to avoid that hell.

When they had visited they had begged, pleaded with him to come back. He was family, things weren't the same, they needed to take care of one another. Things he couldn't find in himself to care about. One thing he had noticed was that they didn't bring the boy along. Oh he knew exactly what the young kid thought about him, he had told it to him straight when they had encountered each other at the hospital. He had the urge to visit and had walked in to find the boy already in the leather chair. Eyes rimmed in red, ugly splotches covering his face. The similarities were staggering. He turned around with all intent and purpose of not coming back again when the sound of a thirteen year-old boy's voice stopped him.

"Who do you think you are?"

He paused at the door.

The boy continued, "Who do you think you are that you think that you get to act like your grief is the worst, that your pain is the deepest?!"

Such words from such a young kid, he turned around in shock.

Voice shaking the boy stood up and fixed a glare on his face, "That is my sister, my sister, on that bed. She's gone now, she might never come back. She might not ever sit with me on the couch and watch bad movies, she may never wake me up by jumping on my bed and singing in that awful voice of hers, she will never be there for my birthdays, when I'm sick, or when I just need my sister!" His voice had risen to the point where he was hollering.

It was several moments till the kid caught his breath again, and his voice was but a deathly whisper, "So who do you think you are acting like this? She would be disgusted."

Without responding he found himself walking out of the room, the hospital, and down the street. Till he started running, running as fast as he could through the frostbitten city. Till he could no longer breath and his legs could carry him no further. He fell to his knees outside the hotel. It always seemed to come back to this place.

He stayed like that, he didn't know how long, till she opened the door. Her small shoulders were covered with a shawl, in hopes of warding off the wind; he skin was paler than he remembered, but then he didn't remember many things these days, and her eyes dull.

"Zero?" She questioned, eyebrows puckering in confusion. "What in the world are you doing out here? You'll catch your death." Oh, the sound of her voice. He had forgotten its effects on him.

She had started coming down the steps when he had finally realized what was happening. He jolted to his feet, heart pounding again. He had to leave. She stopped as well at his sudden movement, the glow of distrust coloring her eyes now. That was good, it would keep her away. He turned away and started walking away, not noticing as she reached subtly towards him, biting her lip.

So here he was, a month later. He no longer visited the hospital. the only time he left the loft was to go across the street to the little convenience store and get food and liquor. Something he should be doing right then.

Shucking on his coat and hat, he took one last swig to warm his body before stepping outside onto the cold, metal stairway. Boots clanking as he stumbled down the steps in the quiet night. The owner of the shop spotted him across the street and unlocked the door. They had a standing agreement, the owner would unlock the door and he wouldn't try to make too much of a mess of himself afterwards.

He stepped into the street, hugging his jacket to his body as a sudden gust of wind captured the road. His hat fell off his head and into the street. Disoriented, he bent to pick it up. Not noticing the bright lights coming towards him and desperate noises begging him to move.

* * *

He woke to beeping and a dark room. His body was tingling. Pain medication. Cords everywhere, around him, in him, attached to him. He shifted, trying to ease his discomfort. It was then as he moved his head around that he noticed the bundle in the corner of the room.

The bundle shifted and sighed, brown hair poking out of the top. The girl inside was contained in a deep sleep, unreachable to him. As it should be. Her eyes were tightly shut, her eyebrows puckering again. She was troubled in her sleep, something he was glad he no longer had to endure. But her being troubled was not something he wanted to see, it reminded him too much of decisions and mattering. Subjects that did not concern him in the slightest.

Looking for distraction his eyes slid across the room. It was small, clinical, and unattached. Perfect.

A light pouring into the room drew his attention. A young nurse entered the room. She was saying something about medication, but the drugs had already taken effect. He sighed as fell peacefully into his oblivion.

* * *

When he awoke again there was arguing.

"He obviously doesn't want to be with us so why are we even here?"

"Because he is still family whether he likes it or not."

"So you want us to take him home where we can all play the 'Watch Zero Self-Destruct' game, is that what I'm getting? You want to put them in that environment?"

"Kamui, please."

He opened his eyes to see the girl, her shoulders smaller and more weighed down than he had ever seen them standing across from the dark haired young man. Kamui's dark eyes were flashing, oh he was furious. Yuuki stood there, pleading.

"You don't need to bother, I'll be going back to my place." His voice had taken on characteristics of the lost: full of rust and empty.

"No you won't." The girl didn't even look at him as she answered, voice cold. "He is coming back with us, getting help, and anything you say against that, Kamui, is frankly irrelevant." He saw the small bit of the girl he used to know shining through: all bravado and sass.

She continued like that, ignoring his rare, lifeless comments and Kamui's heated interjections. She had taken control of the situation once more. She only stopped when the doctor came in and said he would be in the hospital for one week for observation. After that, she had left without a word to either of them, Kamui following not long after.

He was left blissfully alone, no thoughts or people to remind him any stayed that way the rest of the week, they didn't visit. He had begun to think (not hope, hope had abandoned him long ago) that they had forgotten him, or no longer believed he was worth the effort. Because he wasn't.

It wasn't until the last day, the day of his release, that she came back. She was silent as she helped him into the wheelchair and pushed him through the hallways. Too hopped up on his narcotics he didn't notice them pass the exit and enter the ward that he was so familiar with. She opened the door and rolled him through, stopping him at the bedside.

He didn't say anything as he stared down at the familiar face of the young woman and man below him.

"I thought you should see them before we leave. To remind you."

He didn't answer her as he kept staring.  
Realizing this, she continued, "To remind you that not only should you be ashamed of your behavior, but that the fact that it went this far is ridiculous in itself."

She turned his chair so they were now facing each other. Her face was stiff, eyes cold, focusing somewhere over his shoulder, "We are going to fix you, and you are going to pick yourself up and get over yourself."

So they left the hospital, got into the van that was being driven by a solemn Subaru, and entered the hotel. The lobby was empty, the sounds of his wheels on the floor echoing out. They entered the elevator, the three of them silent. A year and a half ago the three of them would be chatting and joking. Now the silence blanketed over them.

She left him behind and turned in the opposite direction Subaru ws steering him, she had obviously had enough with his despondency. Subaru pulled open the door to his room (not the one he had shared with her, he noted) and left after setting him up on the bed.

They had brought him here, expecting him to do god knows what, and all he could think about was what had happened a year ago.

He had said something unforgivable, something that he knew would contain any feeling she had for him in a box far in the recess of her mind, and then she had slapped him. He had finally gotten all the loose ends cut.

Strangely enough, thinking back, he felt more contained after leaving than what he had ever felt, and tried to escape, here at the hotel.

The thought made his head hurt and he wished for the solitude and loneliness of his loft. At least there he knew what to do with himself.

**Wait for death to stop waiting for him.**

* * *

**Sorry for being away for SO LONG.**

**This is the first one-shot out of four. Keep your eyes peeled for more!**


End file.
